Three convicted of kidnapping drug dealer

Federal prosecutors say trio of gang members used a hidden GPS device to track a drug dealer before donning a stolen police uniform and kidnapping him in 2009

Brandon Johansson, Staff Writer, Updated: June 22, 2012 4:10 pm

An Aurora man and two others were convicted this week of kidnapping charges after police say they used a stolen police uniform and hidden GPS device to track and kidnap a cocaine dealer and his family.

The men, Tracy Morgan, aka Tre Dog, 1, of Denver; Killiu Ford, aka Caveman, 38, of Aurora; and Augustus Sanford, aka Turk, 34, of Denver, were convicted Thursday of kidnapping and conspiracy to commit kidnapping. The trio, who prosecutors said are gang members, face at least 20 years in prison, federal prosecutors said.

According to a statement from the United States Attorney’s Office in Denver, in September 2009 the three men planted a GPS device in a cocaine dealer’s car and used a computer to track the man’s movement.

The men also gave drugs to a juvenile in exchange for a Denver police uniform the juvenile had stolen from his father, the statement said.

Later that month, the men, with the help of other suspects who were not been indicted, tracked the drug dealer to Edgewater.

Sanford donned the police uniform and the three men, all armed with guns, kidnapped the man, his wife and their daughters.

One of the men ordered the wife into the passenger seat of her car and then drove her and her two children to their home in Thornton.

Between three and five men then stormed into the family’s home and ordered the wife to tell them where the man kept his money. When the woman refused, the men put a gun to one of the daughter’s heads and forced her to tell.

The men then fled the house with $30,000.

The group who kidnapped the drug dealer then set him free on the side of a road in Thornton.